The Room
by The Blearing Phoenix
Summary: Modern AU; It all takes place in a single room-it becomes the catalyst over the course of Harry and Hermione's relationship during their attendance at university. This is where their connection will blossom and this is where it will end.
1. Chapter 1

**The Room**

Modern AU; It all takes place in a single room—it becomes the catalyst over the course of Harry and Hermione's relationship during their attendance at university. This is where their connection will blossom and this is where it will end.

The Action of Meeting

Harry Potter had gotten the place during his second semester in college. He'd gotten it with one of his other housemates, a boy with dark hair and a face that could make females drop their panties at the mere sight of it. Cedric Diggory. Of course, Cedric had wanted something far flashier and cleaner so he'd passed on his old room to Harry. Here it was, he took it all in: the peeling white stucco, the dinginess of the musty gray carpeting and the cheap fluorescent bulb—one lone bulb spitting out light in a wan glow. There was the old bookcase he'd gotten from IKEA—well, to be fair, he'd apparated to the nearest one and had gotten the majority of his furniture from the well-known store. There was his plain white sofa, plush save for the cheap springs that was rusted from misuse that you'd hear creaking beneath the settling of your weight. The TV sat atop an even plainer light wooden TV stand back against the adjacent wall. The bookcase was full of textbooks for various university courses—mostly Wizarding ones—_The Art of Advanced Appparating; Defensive Magic and the Scientific Facet of It; Historical Wizarding Literature_ (there were splotches of coffee stains where he'd been careless with it, on the surface of the leather book jacket).

It was cheap. It was enough and it would do. More importantly it gave the place something it had been sorely lacking before he'd been nonchalantly informed of its existence: charm. Now it had _loads_ of the stuff. He tightened his hand on the girl beside him with her delicately curled nutmeg hair pulled into a ponytail at the nape of her neck. Her name was Hermione Granger. They'd just come back from some admittedly lackluster concert where the band was fronted by some vampire singer that was more suited for tween admirers than a pair of taciturn matured college students. Still, at least the drumming was good and they could appreciate the average musicality of the band.

"So…? Terrible isn't it?"

Harry smirks because he knew he'd been withholding showing his new girlfriend the place for a while. She was fastidious, the type to color code her subjects in three-ring binders and five-subject notebooks. She shifts all uncomfortable and suppresses a chortle but it fails.

The girl lets out a small laugh and he squeezes her hand reassuringly. Hopes she can't feel the thin film of sweat that suddenly breaks out in small beads on his palms. She's absolutely lovely in her gray Burberry trench coat, the plaid stockings fitted to her slim legs and her fitting chocolate-brown ankle high boots. She's lovely and she doesn't deserve this dingy place.

"It's fine, Harry, I mean it could do with a little fixing up but it's fine."

"Really, are you sure? 'Cause I could just tidy it up a bit but God that wouldn't be right with you here," and he's nervous and mussing up his already unruly hair with his pallid hand. Hermione just smirks and shakes some of her chocolate curls free of its ponytail. Harry wants to fix them back in place, brush them back from her face, but they're not at that point yet. They'd finally held hands for their first date tonight. Up until this point their interactions were purely for academic reasons: Pass the notes, please. Can I look over what you wrote? Do you remember what Professor Sprout told us last Monday? Isn't Severus such a bloody git, Ron? Harry, don't say that! That's so uncouth!

"It's fine; we can just watch some TV for a bit. Maybe you could make some popcorn if you have some, I'd quite like that."

"Ron likes you," Harry remarks because he's seen the way their mutual red-haired friend looks at her.

"He already knows that I chose you though. I only see him as a friend anyway, he's … he's just not my type, Harry. I just hope he handles it okay," Hermione's face softens here and he's fascinated by the way the light spills over the pallor of her skin, washing it yellow and bright.

"He will eventually."

"He should."

"He will," Harry repeats.

The bespectacled boy's heard the way his redheaded friend speaks about Hermione (Blimey Harry, she's gorgeous isn't she? And she's so bloody smart too, bookish and everything. I couldn't compete with her at all; I don't even know if I deserve someone like her). He likes her and it shows in the ruddiness of the redhead's cheeks but Harry finds that he doesn't care. Hermione had already told their friend the truth and he guessed that Ron was taking it alright. If drowning your sorrow in cheap ale and Hog's Head beer could count as "taking it alright." Harry cringed; the boy wasn't going to be phoning him in a friendly way to "just chat" for a long, long time. It would take him a while to get over something like this.

Now they were breaching that friendly territory that newly established familiarity for something far more uncomfortable and newly impassable. The thought of her rejection made Harry's stomach lurch suddenly. He needed to sit down so he guided her to the plain white sofa and lazily flicked his wand so the TV could come to life. There was some stupid reality program on—_Jersey Shore_ or something and they spent the next hour or so flipping channels via their wands: a girl tearfully talked about being under aged and pregnant. There was some American cooking competition show where no one seemed to take the context of the show too seriously. A couple looked decidedly bored with a designer's vision of what their new house should look like.

Hermione's hand tremulously slid into Harry's hesitantly. The light bulb continued to burn that wan glow; suffusing the room with an unnatural but decidedly charming, if not cheapened radiance.

"Some popcorn would be real nice and then we could … study and check the notes for Snape's test," she stifles a yawn with her small hand and curls herself against Harry's body. She wants his warmth. He decides to subconsciously give it to her in the small space of the room. And this is how they stay for the rest of the night until Ron calls and drunkenly curses Harry out for "taking the girl who _I_ was gonna bloody ask out" and how could he and how could he because they were friends! Friends didn't do that. But then … Harry didn't care because Ron would have to let it go. Well, he decides, it wasn't that he didn't care for Ron, he did. He just knew that Ron would have to accept his newly found relationship with Hermione. Harry's hand finds Hermione's as they fall asleep in the uncleanly plainness of his dimly lit room.


	2. Chapter 2

**The Room**

The Action of Dating

"So you're fine with this Hermione? Dating me?" Harry glanced at the dark-haired girl in question. He wasn't sure how he'd conjured up the courage to officially ask her out on a date those two Tuesdays ago but he had. The important thing was that he _had_. Hermione smiled at him and chuckled cutely. He thought her adorable, if not insufferably annoying with how proficient she was at many Wizarding and Muggle subjects alike.

"Oh Harry …," she chuckled some more and he looked at her quizzically.

"What?" His voice was one of genuine puzzlement as the wan light gave off an eerie glow in the tiny enclosed space.

"Of course I'm fine with it," Hermione said, with the certainty of a mad person trying to prove that the elusive Crumple-Horned Snorkack existed. Harry bit his lip because no, he wasn't so sure and he'd glanced at the phone many times willing Ron to just _not _phone him if he would please. Harry had made his choice and couldn't Ron just go back to ogling the pretty and well-mannered Cho Chang, the delicate Asian girl who had years of maturity on Hermione and was just as studious. He thinks of how Ron ignores him in the hallways now, mutters things darkly about how he has to hang out with Fred and George and help Ginny with some homework now that she's finishing up her last year at Hogwarts.

Harry thought about how it was possibly a load of bull because he was pretty sure that Ron just went home and sulked, flew around on his broom except for the days where there was inclement weather and wondered about how it would feel to run his fingers through Hermione's curly ringlets.

"Well I'm quite lucky to have you."

"Indeed, I could've gone for Viktor Krum, you know?"

Hermione gave Harry a knowing look and smirked. Her new boyfriend thought back to the tall Hungarian trying to court her and he inwardly scowled in jealousy. Krum had given her half-withered daisies once and sent her chocolates far too sweet from Diagon Alley on his time off of class. Hermione didn't appreciate that but she'd thanked him. Harry knew now after even a few weeks of dating one of his best friends that she liked chocolate frogs and fine Muggle chocolates the most; she liked Wizarding books on subjects like _Occlumency_ and the art of Apparating. She liked engaging in the process of making potions, failing and then having to try again. She liked working tirelessly and tinkering with her Time-Tuner to make sure that she handed all of her assignments on time. He watched her, her brow wrinkling in concentration. He'd invited her to his crappy apartment to study. She was now sitting precariously, cross-legged on the white couch. Her hands delicately poised over parchment paper as she bit her lip in thought. A habit, one Harry found endearing. He adored her. He kept his adorations a secret; he wasn't like Ron, making his nervousness and infatuation with a girl a public. He kept it quiet and locked away; just as he had when he was younger.

"I'll get you some chocolate frogs for your birthday, how does that sound?"

It was a few weeks away and he knew she'd adore it but then she'd say …

"Oh Harry, you don't have to do that. My mum and dad are taking me out to dinner and you'll be so busy helping out at the Three Broomsticks."

"But I _want_ to do it Hermione, please," and he hoped that the look in his eyes conveyed all the feelings he couldn't squeeze into her hands and rub into her aching back.

"Alright," she relented and he kissed her softly on the mouth and he thought of how lucky he was to have a girl like her on a gloomy Saturday night, poring over notes in his dingy hand-me-down apartment. Oh, how lucky was he?


End file.
